The Nanker are a race of aliens that lived long before the human race existed. All Nanker are telepathically connected, while some even have other psychic powers.

Seeking to extend their life, the Nanker created tiny medical nanites to heal and maintain their bodies. The nanites hive became sentient and started taking over their host bodies, naming themselves the Cenari. Seeking to overthrow their creators, the hive rebelled. The Nanker originally mistook the conflict as a civil war, but realized the true invaders much too late.

At what was to be the Cenari's final assault on the Nanker home world, a lone soldier stole a ship with a secret weapon that was meant to destabilize the tech that the Cenari was depend upon. However, the Nanker were also dependent on that technology as well. 

Little is know of what became of the Nanker after the last stand, if they even survived. All that remains of the Nanker is a pillar on their home world, now a desert planet, and their ship that saved them, now the center of the Gum Nebula, a byproduct of their secret weapon and the destruction of the Cenari forces.